Former city manager Prosser gets new gig

CEDAR RAPIDS - Jim Prosser is the new executive director of the Centralina Council of Governments, the lead regional planning organization in and around Charlotte, N.C.

Prosser was named to the post in mid-November after interviews with a selection committee comprised of elected officials and city managers throughout the Charlotte region. The previous director retired in December.

Prosser, 59, became the city of Cedar Rapids' first city manager when the city moved in January 2006 from a commission form of government with full-time commissioner/council members to a counCil/manager government with a part-time council and full-time professional city manager.

Prosser helped lead the city through the June 2008 flood and into the city's flood recovery before reaching a “separation agreement” with the City Council in April 2010. The agreement included a year of severance pay.

In June 2010, Prosser was named one of three finalists for an executive director's post at the Municipal Technical Advisory Service at the University of Tennessee's Institute for Public Service.

He subsequently created his own consulting firm, JDP Public Partnership Group, and moved from Cedar Rapids to the riverfront in St. Paul, Minn.

In 2008, Prosser was named Manager of the Year by the Iowa City/County Management Association, but it took three months for the public to find out about it. Prosser never the award.F